Bobby Scott: “Mr. Speaker, before we can even consider sending more of our young men and women into harm's way, we must first…”

“Mr. Speaker, before we can even consider sending more of our young men and women into harm's way, we must first determine what our mission is in Iraq. Only then will it be possible to intelligently discuss the number of troops necessary to meet that mission. But 4 years after going to war in Iraq, the administration has yet to clearly articulate a mission. Without a mission and a strategy with a credible chance of success, we should not even be discussing an increase in troop levels. Mr. Speaker, before we respond to the President's call for an escalation of the war in Iraq, we must first put his speech in the context of the history of the war in Iraq. We need to begin with a discussion of what the current 130,000 troops are doing in Iraq now before we can discuss what 20,000 additional troops might do. The original reasons which were provided as the rationale for going to war, Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, Iraqi leaders were connected with the 9/11 attacks, and that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the United States, all turned out not to be true.”